There Are No Happy Endings
by drakontion
Summary: Dragon Age II. Because Anders broke my heart. Spoilerific for endings.


"Anders, what have you done?"

He didn't even look at her as the wreckage soared gracefully through the air, a million tiny comets falling to the ground at their feet. Shooting stars, every star a death, a soul: burnt in a conflagration of magic and pride.

_Who would have thought_, she mused inconsequentially as she stood in a rain of chaos, _that the death of the Chantry was more beautiful than it had any right to be?_ That even though this man at her side had killed the one chance of reconciliation this blighted city had, she still loved him? The searing ache in her heart was more due to his betrayal of _her_ than of Kirkwall. When did she become so arrogant that the Maker's love was worth less to her than the apostate's?

He avoided her gaze, his brown eyes wholly his as he refused to acknowledge hers. Not even the excuse of Justice shining from within them to explain his actions. The ache in her heart grew larger, spread upwards, her throat growing tighter and her eyes burning. _From the smoke,_ she told herself, as she brushed tears away. _From the smoke._

She studied him, the despair buried beneath resignation and acceptance in his face. Studied the lines on his forehead that had grown deeper over the past years. The slump to his shoulders, once broad and proud. The shake in his hands that belied his defiant stance. The aura of aloneness that even now tried to push her and everyone else away, that he'd carefully cultivated and nurtured and fostered until she felt like she would scream and stab him, torn between loving him and wanting him to open up to her.

"What have you done," she breathed. _What have you done to me?_

As if he heard her thoughts, rather than her words, he turned and looked into her eyes for the first time since he'd thumped his staff on the stones and made the Chantry incandesce. Maybe he read the incredulous disbelief, the hurt of betrayal in her face, because his softened. He reached out a hand, a familiar hand whose touch she cherished and craved, and rested it on her cheek.

"I'm sorry. If you knew..."

Her eyes filled with tears and even now she nestled her face into his hand, murderer though he was.

Kirkwall was in flames, her people screaming, her forces in disarray, and she loved him. Behind her her friends babbled, but she couldn't recognise the words, couldn't acknowledge them. _He_ was all that mattered. He'd used her and lied to her and betrayed her, and still he was the most important thing to her. He'd forced her to a choice she never wanted to make, and still she wanted him, needed him. He'd torn out her heart but she'd still give him what remained.

She stared up at him, even as he stared down at her, while around them a city, an Order, a power crumbled. He wiped away the tears that overflowed with his thumb, a lover's touch, soft and gentle and oh so caring. _He's a murderer_, part of her mind screamed at her. _He's a healer_, countered another part. _Murderer! _she howled. _Murderer!_

She took a deep breath and quelled the riotous, disparate parts of herself. _Yes. He is. But ...I love him._

For an unknown time they stared at each other. She measured what was happening behind his gaze. He was so... resigned. Whatever befell him, he would accept, as no better or no worse than he deserved.

Her breath hitched. He wanted to die.

"Decide what you're going to do," said Orsino from behind her.

She looked around at her friends, at how they'd arrayed themselves either for her or against her. At the city she was a Champion of, though never really felt she belonged in. At the man in front of her, who had broken her heart even as he handed her his own.

She was forced to the choice and she chose... him.

And maybe she imagined it, but surely that was gratitude on his face? Or was that just her own desperate, selfish need to not be alone in this world?

"Maker help us all," she whispered, and strode into the fires, abomination by her side, apostates, rogues and warriors behind her.


End file.
